A series of adverts for the horror film Captivity, starring 24 actor Elisha Cuthbert, have been pulled from US billboards.

A spokesman for distributor Lionsgate said the posters had been removed following a large number of complaints from members of the public.

The series of adverts featured Cuthbert being kidnapped, tortured and killed, with the tags, "Abduction", "Confinement", "Torture" and "Termination".

Captivity centres on a couple who awaken to find themselves trapped in a cellar where a kidnapper slowly attempts to drive them mad.

With a plot not far off from the popular Saw series, it's perhaps not surprising that the movie has hit similar objections in its publicity campaign. The posters for Saw II, which featured two severed fingers depicting the roman numerals II, had to be removed after intervention by the Motion Picture Association of America.

Lionsgate spokesman Peter Wilkes said the adverts had been independently put together by Captivity's production company, After Dark.

"Once aware of the materials and the reaction to them, we immediately asked After Dark to remove the billboards, to which they immediately and cooperatively responded," he said.

A spokesman for After Dark blamed the emergence of the adverts, which appeared on 30 Los Angeles billboards and 1,400 New York taxi tops, on a mistake at the printing plant.